"Finally! Haheeha! After all these years! REVENGE!"

The giant shouted the final word, shaking the grass around them and echoing off the trees. Crisis saw Beth rooted to the spot she was standing in fear. The man who had screamed before started running away, but the giant raised his staff and the man floated into the air, arms and legs flailing wildly. "What the-"

"CRISIS! The tables sure have turned, haven't they!?"

Crisis shook in terror as she saw the look of pure rage on the man's face. Her mind raced, not understanding what the man meant, how he knew her name, or what his problem was. Why did this giant hate her so much, and what was he planning to do to her? She yelled out in confusion, as loud as she could, as the giant was huge and far away.

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN?"

"HeeheeHOOHOO!" the mad giant roared, the levitating man shaking in the air. "You don't even know what this is about. GOOD! I DIDN'T EITHER!"

The floating man flailed as he soared higher and higher, towards the giant's face. "What's going on!?" he yelled. "What the hell is this, who the hell are you, WHAT ARE YOU D-"

The man was cut off as the giant opened his mouth and sent the man flying in with a flick of his finger, then snapped his mouth shut.

That was enough to snap Beth out of her horrified daze. She bolted, in the opposite direction the man had, but she soon floated off the ground too with a shriek.

Beth shook uncontrollably as she was lifted above the giant's head. Crisis and Beth both saw him open his mouth, the man inside shrieking and trying to claw his way out, but being easily shoved back into the throat by the wizard's tongue along with gravity, and swallowed. As the wiggling lump appeared in the giant's throat, Beth vomited, the contents of her half-digested ham and egg sandwich falling a hundred feet to splash against the forest floor. She gasped for breath and screamed, a desperate, pained sound Crisis never thought would have come from her best friend's throat. She begged. "Crisis. Help me. Please."

Tears streamed down Crisis' face as she stared at the horrific scene in front of her. She had no idea what was going on, and there was nothing she could really do. Her mind raced through what few options she had. She had to say something convincing, and soon. She took a wild guess.

"You said my name! You said you wanted revenge! It's me you want, isn't it? Not her! Don't-" she sobbed, "Don't take my best friend! She has nothing to do with this!"

"My family didn't have anything to do with you! My wife, my children-"

Tears rolled down the giant's face. He shook, then yelled in rage, an inhuman, deafening sound.

"YOU TOOK THEM ANYWAY! AND YOU WOULD HAVE TAKEN ME TOO! YOU DIDN'T CARE! YOU DIDN'T EVEN EXPLAIN WHY! YOU JUST TOOK THEM! SO I HAVE NO PROBLEM TAKING THOSE YOU LOVE FROM YOU!"

The grass shook. Birds and... larger things took to the skies, fleeing the terrible noise. It was all Crisis could do to get her bearings and respond. Her ears rung, and she could barely hear herself as she shouted back.

"I DIDN'T DO ANYTHING TO YOU! I DON'T EVEN KNOW WHERE I AM, LET ALONE WHAT YOU'RE TALKING ABOUT! JUST PLEASE, PLEASE LEAVE US ALONE!"

The giant gestured with his staff, and Crisis was gripped by a tremendous, invisible force. She rocketed off the ground until she was face-to-face with the monster.

"I took your memory, so that you could suffer in the same confusion and terror I did all those years ago. But I should fill you in, because I want you to face what you did before you die."

Crisis still didn't understand, but something deep inside her told her this made too much sense to be completely made up. She had forgotten... some things... recently. So she listened.

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

"You were the scourge of these lands. You ATE my family, you ATE everyone who went into your territory, whether accidentally or purposefully. You killed them all. You didn't even TALK to them, innocents and the guilty all met the same fate, just for being human. YOU'VE MURDERED TENS OF THOUSANDS, MAYBE HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE! Nobody has ever judged you for your crimes before, nobody was powerful enough. But now I have the power, and so I must judge you GUILTY!"

Crisis saw Beth's eyes widened in shock at this accusation.

"That's not me," Crisis cried, as much to Beth as to the giant, "I would never do such a thing!"

"You would, and you have. Trust me, you're getting off easy, here, with the crimes you've committed. But now it's time to face your fate."

He callously tossed a flailing Beth into his mouth. Crisis looked down in horror, saw her arm futilely reaching out for help she couldn't provide, heard her screams fade as she was pulled down the throat, nothing more than another bulge like the man who had gone before.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOO!" Crisis couldn't believe it. Her best friend was gone. Just like that. This couldn't be real, right? This had to be a dream!

"I've seen this place before!" she yelled with frantic joy, "In dreams! I dreamed this place up! This isn't real! Hahahahah! I'm just having a nightmare!"

"This is real, all right." The giant spat the words. "You don't get off that easily. I'll prove to you that it's real."

His staff glowed a bright green, but Crisis barely noticed the glow, as information slammed into her mind like an asteroid impact.

She could barely hear herself mindlessly screaming. She couldn't comprehend all this information at once. Decades of memories flooded into her awareness in the span of seconds.

As her mind slowly pieced itself back together, still reeling from the biggest shock she had ever received in her life, Crisis knew. She knew that what the man had said about her was true. She was not human. She was a snake-woman, a naga. This land was her home. She had lived here for sixty years on the life-sustaining magic in the soil, and indeed, she had eaten any humans she could get her hands on. The memories were far too vivid and numerous to deny.

She just didn't know how to react to this information. She deflated. "I'm sorry." she said in a tiny voice. "I'm so sorry."

She now knew why she couldn't remember anything about her parents. They never existed. They were little more than an excuse the spell had come up with for her existence on Earth. They never even had names. Crisis' entire life was a lie, and the truth was much larger and stranger than she had ever thought.

"SORRY DOESN'T CUT IT! Do you remember now, how you tore my life apart just because you were HUNGRY!?"

She thought back to the times she had eaten humans, and other human-like things: nekos, elves, even smaller nagas. There were so many. The worst thing was, she remembered liking it. She couldn't understand now how she had enjoyed their begging for mercy, their struggling...

She looked at the wizard's face, and looked back at the humans she had caught. She tried to remember, but...

"I'm sorry. I still don't remember you." she said after a long pause.

"Of course you don't," the wizard spat, his voice dripping with contempt. "My family was just one snack among thousands for you. But here's one snack you won't ever forget. I've been waiting for this for a long time." He opened his mouth once more.

"No, don't eat-"

But Crisis' voice was weak, and was cut off as she was sealed inside the disgusting mouth. She was violently shoved around and soaked in saliva, sticking her shirt and jeans to her skin. She couldn't help but struggle a bit, even as she knew it wouldn't help. No matter how hard the humans had fought, she remembered, they only ever managed to tickle her. Only this time, she was the human.

Soon she slid backwards into the throat, utterly failing to grab hold of anything. As the horrible tube squeezed her down into the darkness, some part deep within her cried out in unfairness. This wasn't what was supposed to happen! She, Crisis, was the predator, not the prey!

The smell of vomit, or rather what would be vomit were it outside, assaulted Crisis' nostrils. The last thing she wanted was to fall into a pool of the noxious stuff, and yet she couldn't avoid it as she was shoved out of the man's esophagus and into his stomach.

She couldn't see, but she could hear and feel the stomach churning, the heart beating, and the yells of the previous victims. She started to feel the burn of the awful liquid through her clothes and on her exposed skin. "Let us out!" yelled the man, flailing around, accidentally hitting Crisis. But the other voice was what really caught her attention.

"Crisis? Is that you?" Beth's voice was hollow, like she was already resigned to her fate.

"Yes, it's me."

"What he said about you... that you ate humans... is it true?"